Theatreport.com- Theatre in Houston, Texas - Forum
“Do you know who that is?” I had just stepped onto the Lexington Avenue subway platform in the middle of the afternoon rush hour. Almost immediately, I felt someone pulling my shirt sleeve. I looked down and saw a little old man standing beside me pointing his finger at the name on the baseball cap I was wearing – STANISLAVSKY. I must have looked confused as my new friend repeated his question, “Do you know who that is?” It took a few more moments for my slow Southern charm to respond to New York directness. “Yes, I do,” I said. “Stanislavsky was a famous actor and director from Russia.” By now the expression on the man’s face had changed from excited questioning to pure joy as he continued, “I saw Stanislavsky act! I saw the Moscow Art Theatre here in 1923! I was there! I’ll never forget the CHERRY ORCHARD. I’ve gone to theatre all my life but I’ve never seen anything to equal Stanislavsky. I saw him! I saw him!
I read theatreport too much...
Bobby's stuff is always worth reading.
this is so good that I just printed out the whole thing (yay free printing at work) to hold on to.
go read it.
it's good writing and the topic is interesting.
Tuesday, April 05, 2005
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2 comments:
If I understand correctly, Chekhov thought that Stanislavsky didn't really understand his work. Moscow Art's productions of Chekhov's plays, while successful from the audience's point of view, were too dark, missing a lot of absurd humor that the good doctor consciously put into it. I must admit that I didn't even like Chekhov until I learned that it was okay to laugh at all his pathetic characters, myself. I mean, who can take a line like "I wear black because I'm in mourning for my life" seriously?
Wait. Never mind, I can think of four people off the top of my head who could.
That's odd for me to think about.
The funny in Chekov has always been there for me. Maybe it was because the first time I read him that was emphasized.
But I would think as an actor the first obvious choice would be to make the suffering you find in his plays to be noble or tragic, not silly...but in Chekov a lot of suffering is silly. By that I mean that many of his character seem to be suffering from their own choices, or vanities, or weaknesses as much if not more than they are suffering from anything put upon them. If you are an old man in love with a totally inappropriate younger woman, or the head of a family about to lose its home, well those situations won't feel funny to you, no matter how funny they are on the outside...
for the record, I really know little to nothing about Chekov, Stanislavsky, acting, or anything...
but I sure do like to talk...
hehe...
"I wear black on the outside because black is how I feel on the inside"
- Morrisey
See, I've always thought Morrisey was funny too...
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